


the distance to your home

by psychedelia



Series: Good Guy Stryfe AU [1]
Category: Cable (Comics), Marvel, X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Gen, Good Guy Stryfe AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 14:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20194087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psychedelia/pseuds/psychedelia
Summary: Scott and Charles have an argument about the status of Isaac Summer's rehoming in the X Mansion. Isaac overhears.





	the distance to your home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kokopellifacetattoo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kokopellifacetattoo/gifts).

If his thoughts held shape, they’d be a tangled mass of barbed wire, thick and compressed into an uncompromising ball, unbreakable, impassable, unknown.  _ Dangerous _ .

At least, that’s what Professor Xavier says to Scott Summers, the man he has been told will be his new father. 

He sits outside the office, his eye boring holes into the hardwood floors. If he had his new father’s skill set, perhaps there would be  _ actual _ holes in the floor, smoldering and red-hot and  _ powerful _ , oh-so powerful in a way that makes Stryfe jealous. 

Or, well, he’s been told he has a new name.  _ Isaac _ . He likes the way it buzzes on his tongue, the way it ends harshly and with finality. A powerful name for a powerful man, and he’s supposed to be a powerful man when he grows up, the  _ most _ powerful. But who knows what will happen now, now that he’s been  _ stolen _ , stolen and taken here, in the past, with this buffoon’s gallery of mutants.

He hopes Professor Xavier stings himself on the barbed wire in his mind; he shouldn’t be looking in places he’s unwanted, and despite his new father telling him that he can’t  _ hurt _ Xavier, he doesn’t have to know about the little electric shocks that should make a telepath like Xavier  _ embarrassed _ and  _ ashamed _ . 

His new father is yelling. He’s so full of rage sometimes; Isaac has known him for merely a week and already he can feel the thick hot anger that envelops him sometimes, as red and molten as the lasers that constantly threaten to leak from his eyes.

As far as he can gather, no one wants him here. He’s not sure why; he really doesn’t want to be here, either, and it’s only the efforts of Nathan Summers and Scott Summers that are keeping him here. He’s certain Jean Grey doesn’t want him here either, even though her and Isaac’s new father are evidently a  _ couple _ and Nathan Summers wants her to be his mother. 

He’s uncertain about that. 

Isaac slips from the chair and sits opposite of it, leaning against the wall with his legs splayed out in front of him. There’s three chairs, and he works on levitating two; Scott Summers is still yelling and Charles Xavier is still attempting to keep his mind hidden from Isaac, and it’s simply not worth it to give himself a migraine trying to poke around when he’s certain he can glean everything he wants to know from his new father later, anyways. 

The chairs fall to the ground when Scott Summers all but crashes out of the office, his mind leaking off frustration and anger and… determination, and his angry huff turns into one of exasperation as he watches the chairs fall to the floor, crashing and nearly breaking. 

“Isaac.” He says, and he can tell how much he’s attempting to keep his voice level. He’d be doing a convincing job, if he weren’t practically sweating and his fists weren’t clenched and his skinny shoulders weren’t hunched up in tension, let alone the veritable wave of despaired energy coming off his mind. 

“You distracted me,” Isaac replies, and stands quickly, shoving his hands behind his back and trying to stand taller. “It’s not my fault.” He’s expecting a reprimand, or worse, but Scott merely sighs and puts the chairs back upright and then gestures for Isaac to follow him down the wall. 

“Let’s not break Professor Xavier’s stuff. Especially not when he’s already angry,” Scott says, and his mind says  _ Great. Exhibiting his early powers right in the midst of an argument. That won’t look bad at  _ ** _all_ ** **. **

“Well, I didn’t break anything.” 

“Isaac.” 

He struggles to keep up with Scott; Scott Summers is tall and lanky and his stride is long, especially when he’s frustrated and clearly wants to get as far away from Professor Xavier’s office as he can. Isaac all but runs to catch up with him and, hoping he won’t get slapped for the audacity, grabs hold of Scott’s hand to keep him from walking too fast. 

Scott almost stops in his tracks but covers it up, and his expression furrows underneath his red glasses. But instead of shaking Isaac off, or yelling at him, or telling him he’s pathetic or weak or something else, he just slows down and keeps his hand pressed firm against Isaac’s, and some of the tension leaks out from his shoulders, like touching Isaac is keeping him grounded. 

Isaac stays quiet for a few minutes, and very tentatively breaches the subject; “The Professor doesn’t want me here.” 

Scott sighs again, and, evidently deciding they’re walking too slow, stops and bends to scoop Isaac up. Isaac could kill him if he wanted to, and probably should, but this man has been the only man who has been kind to him, and has gone out of his way to give Isaac a home here. For some reason. He doesn’t get it. He really doesn’t, and he’s gleaned no motivation from his mind other than that he  _ wants _ to, and something else, something emotional, something Isaac doesn’t quite understand. It’s a warmth, but not the kind that turns to red-hot rage. It’s a warmth like the hearth of a fireplace, comfortable, and life-giving and… directed at him. 

He’s unsure of what it means. 

Scott spares him a glance and then looks away. He seems to do that a lot; eye contact when he’s angry, livid, and then very little at all. It doesn’t seem to be a sign of passivity, or weakness, or submission, or disrespect, though, like he would have assumed, merely one of this man’s strange quirks. 

“Well, the Professor can, quite frankly, shove it. He doesn’t get to just turn you away.” 

“It’s his school.”

“Yeah, well, it’s also  _ my _ home, and I’d rather you were here than where you were.” 

None of them seem to understand that he was intended for greatness, for power, for ultimate superiority. They all seem to think it was  _ bad _ , that Apocalypse was  _ bad _ , and it doesn’t make a lick of sense to him, but then again, all of the mutants here are weaker than what he was intended to be. But he doesn’t say that to Scott, because when he says things like that, there’s a deliate frown that runs across his face that Isaac has learned he doesn’t like to cause. 

“I’ll be good. But he keeps trying to go into my brain. I don’t like that. Yours, too. I don’t like that, either.” 

Scott fields him another one of his quick looks, this one curious and worried and surprised all at once. He’s hard to read with the glasses on, sometimes, or the visor, but combined with the residual emotional discharge coming off him in waves, it’s not usually  _ too  _ difficult. He’s not exactly that complicated of a man.

“He should ask permission, just like you should.” 

“But he doesn’t.” 

“Well,” Scott says slowly, and his grip around Isaac’s waist, as they walk, tightens slightly, “Then I guess you’ll just have to be better than him.” 

He wants to say  _ I already am _ , but Scott is already kind to him, and he doesn’t want to push his place too far in this new home. So instead he says, “I will be. New rules here. I can follow them.”

“...Atta boy.” Scott says, and at the very least, he looks less angry than he did before, calmer and emitting that warmth that Isaac still doesn’t have a name for. He quite likes it, though; it feels nice. Like he did something  _ good _ and like Scott likes him. He’s certain this new father might actually like him, and for now, that’s enough to keep him with the desire to  _ stay _ here, in this new strange past.

**Author's Note:**

> sekwoja on tumblr. check me out.


End file.
